Posted by Naomi on Aug 24, 2010 in
Family,
random sweet nothings...,
wellbeing Sometimes getting away from it all means taking the kids and the dog. It means finding time when we are all free of work, study and school… for us, this had not happened for a few years. Then, the stars aligned. Hubby’s Grandmother celebrated her 90th birthday, meaning we would all be in the same place at the same time. We finally managed to have a family holiday together. This involved a trip to Tasmania and the chance to return to the family shack. While holidays with kids and a dog in tow are not all sleep ins and lazy days with a book in one hand, a beverage of choice in the other, we did on this trip manage just a little of that…
On a table just inside the front door of our house sits a piece of gnarled, weathered wood. It is, I suppose drift wood… but it wasn’t collected from a beach.
On mantle pieces, book shelves, desks, table tops are the flotsam of memory. Stones, shells, feathers, wood. Items collected from holidays, walks, friend’s homes. The wood at the front door is part of my more recent collection. Most days I glance at it, some days I stop to touch it’s smooth curves and smile at the memory it evokes…
Early on a March morning, as most people were tucked in bed, our house was in a state of quiet excitement. The car was packed, the note was left on the table for the friend feeding our cat and fish, bottles of water carefully upturned into the pot plants. We were ready. In the dark, cold morning rain we set off… Hubby at the wheel, Green Eyed Girl and Blue Eyed Boy snuggled in the back with their iPods, DS’s, books, and an excited puppy, somewhat bewildered at his new doggy seat belt indignity. We turned onto the road and headed towards the city and the boat that waited to carry us across Bass Strait to Tasmania. We were heading home. Well to one of them. It gives me a great sense of happiness to tell the kids how lucky we are to call two places home.
Upon arrival in Tasmania some nine hours later we headed in to Devonport for supplies before hitting the road to our first destination. The Shack.
The Shack has been holiday home to family and friends for the past nine years. Technically my parent’s retreat, but a family home away from home for us as well. As we neared The Shack, on empty dirt roads I had an overwhelming wave of feeling, part nostalgia, part relief after a very stressful and busy term one. We arrived late at night, in the bitter cold of the Tasmanian Central Highlands. The four of us quickly swung into routine. Hubby getting the power on, checking the pump and hoping the water pipes were not frozen. Kids, unpacking what they could from the car, me, getting the fire roaring.
The next four days followed a pattern of quiet relaxation. Strolls to the river, walks along the dirt road, building fires outside and cooking toast over the coals. It was a time of nothing much… and that in itself was perfect.
I have an absolute love for the Highlands. It goes beyond the harsh beauty of the land, beyond the pull of nostalgia. Beyond the tie to family and country. It has become part of who I am. Part of what I am made of. My father is a fly fisherman and while we spent many years at the beach, (often living in walking distance to one) my history is tied to the lakes and rivers. Tied to button grass and the ripple of a trout rise. Following my father’s footfall as he edged along a lake. Waiting with sisters and Mum, a book cast aside for smooth stone fossicking. The boredom of last years magazines re-read yet again. This is a holiday to me. I am happy that my children too find peace in the quiet that this kind of holiday can bring.
On this particular trip there was the added excitement of Hubby’s birthday and our wedding anniversary, having cleverly married the day before his birthday, we always remember both. On the last full day before heading on to Hobart we celebrated Hubby’s birthday. We packed sausages, onion, bread and condiments in an esky. Long sticks with wire sausage holders on the ends, fashioned from a coat hanger came too. We headed to the Great Lake shore. We saw no one. The clear blue of the Tasmanian sky welcomed us, only to be chased away as grey clouds raced across on the bracing wind.
We scrounged for wood to light a fire. Kids, off in separate directions, a challenge for the dog to keep both in check. The lake was choppy due to the wind. But we still managed to skip stones. The sun that broke through cloud drifts made the water sparkle. It was one of those days where the small bickering bothered no one. The quiet was so welcoming and calm. I could feel the stress from the first part of the year blow away on the wind.
With the fire going we cooked our sausages and feasted on them with soft onion, mustard and swiss cheese. After lunch the kids walked along the shore, the sky flashing promise of blue between the grey. I am not sure really what had more beauty in it, the blue or the grey sky.
As we packed the car, while the kids and the dog played along the lake edge, I picked up a piece of wood, I placed it in the front in a spare cup holder, and there it remained until we returned home, a perfect reminder of our day by the lake.
This is my entry for for Kidspot top 50 bloggers. While you’re here, I’d love to know what makes family holidays memorable for you? Oh & PS… If you like this, then just a quick click here and one more on the thumbs up would be much appreciated… thanks x
Tags: birthday, blue eyed boy, green eyed girl, holiday
Earlier this week the Blue Eyed Boy went on school camp. Hubby and the Green Eyed Girl were there to wave him off on the bus while I was at work. I collected the Green Eyed Girl from school at the end of the day and home we went.
On returning home from school there is a flurry of activity, daily chores to be done, afternoon tea to be devoured, homework, screen time. Apart from the natter of how was your day and newsletter reading, permission form filling in, and some homework checking, I have been made redundant in this. Over the past year there has been quite a shift in our home dynamic. The kids have done a lot of growing up. Suddenly the independence and autonomy I had been working towards and sometimes yearning for is here… and as much as I like it, with one child away there was a definite lack of clatter and chat.
The Green Eyed Girl was happily cocooned in head phones and email messaging to a school friend. Tea was sorted. Hubby was working in the cupboard office. As I walked through the kitchen, I had a sudden thought… which I could almost hear pinging off the walls in the oh so quiet house. This is what it’s going to be like when the kids leave home… this rattle and quiet and jobs done…I stopped. I shoved the thought back. I wasn’t ready for it to be a real thought.
Oh, I have plenty of days when I mutter away about please for the love of Pete when will they leave home? But when given a taste (and I know it was a very tiny taste) I am just not sure I’ll be as pleased as I joke I will be. For the first time in eleven years I am aware of a new stage in mothering. The stage where mother bird doesn’t need to be there… the stage when the baby birds have left the nest.
I know this is the way it’s meant to be. I have carefully lengthened and loosened the ties. I know I want independent children who challenge and problem solve and make their own way, even if it is not my way. And I know for sure that the empty nest is still a long, long way off. But this week I have had a glimmer of what that may be like. Perhaps when the time comes I will be a little more prepared.
But I’ll tell you one thing… I sure was happy when the house was full again.
Tags: blue eyed boy, children, green eyed girl, parenting, wrapped in love
Posted by Naomi on Aug 18, 2010 in
hump day *With a side of shameless self promotion
I’ll be the first to put my hand up and say this week finding the happy is none too easy, and it’s weather induced gloom. But, as this is a happy space, I’ll just have to build a bridge and get over myself! The weather here in Melbourne has been unpredictable and on the cold side of super chilly. But I know it won’t last too much longer… right?
So, on to the main game… namely looking back over the past seven days and remembering some of the things that made me smile.
The Green Eyed Girl bought these lanterns with her hard earned pocket money. Cherry blossom paper lanterns holding fairy lights... what's not to smile about?
I received this gorgeous hand knitted beanie in the mail form the talented Thea. It's ruby redness is as warming as the wool it's made from. Just click on this pic to go to her handmade store.
…and (yes folks here’s the shameless self promotion!) I have been selected as one of Kidspot’s top 50 bloggers. I am in the company of some of my favourite bloggers, and I have the chance to win a trip to Dunk Island! So, *ahem* click here and vote for me! Then go and vote for some of the other bloggers on the list. While you’re there go and check out this list of bloggeriffic bloggers that didn’t make the top 50, but are just as worthy of your reading… and yet more of them are on my daily reading list.
Oh…. and I have finally managed to get myself a followers space on the side bar, as well as a facebook page… yes, I am a technical genius and can copy and paste code! So, what are you waiting for? Don’t be shy! Here endith the shameless self promotion… because I’m even rolling my eyes at myself now!
So, that’s my happy for the week.
Now over to you… what has made you smile this week?
Happy Hump Day!
N xxx
Tags: green eyed girl, hump day, Shopping
As I stood on the escalator going down I looked at the girl in front of me. Tall, thin, confident. She looked back and smiled, and I fell in love all over again.
How could this person I looked at be the babe I bore? How did she get to be this grown?
Stepping off the escalator we walked side by side towards our store of choice.
“Do you want to hold my hand?” I asked.
“Nope, I’m right,” came the reply, without a hint of regret.
I knew this was one of those moments in time that I needed to remember. I wanted to freeze frame it as my heart clenched. I rummaged through my bag to get my iPhone, thinking if I slowed my pace I could take a photo of her from the back… but she slowed to match my speed. I knew that I couldn’t ask her to walk ahead, the self conscious would take over and the photo would be a lie. So I put my phone away.
I know this is a fragment in time. I know that the path is not always like this. I know there is door slamming, and I hate you! Clashing and worry. Anger, hers and mine.
But this moment is none of that. She may not want to hold my hand, but she still wants to walk beside me. For now, that will do.
Tags: green eyed girl, parenting, wrapped in love
Posted by Naomi on Aug 4, 2010 in
Family,
friends,
random sweet nothings... 
There has been a bit of a break in hump day posts. It’s not that there has been no happiness, more that I have not really been in a place where I wanted to post about it. I know this is contrary to my very own reasons on why I started this post. It’s also contrary to the rules I made up for hump day comments! But there you go, that’s the way the cookie crumbles.
But Hump Day is back! So, here goes…
We had a very full, and very satisfying weekend here… more than enough happened to keep me happy.
- I had a whole hour on the train into the city reading. I had Mumford & Sons on my iPod and a book in my hand… what a lovely start to the day.
- I walked through the city I love seeing the rumblings and promise of the day to come.
- I met up with the gorgeous and oh so lovely Jodie and Megan for brunch. We chatted away like old friends, not all that surprising as we chat most days on twitter and various blogs… so we could skip all that new friend chit chat about weather, and Hubbies, and where we live and what we like, because we know all that already! It was lovely.
- The football. Two codes in one day. What too much? Perhaps, but we did it! Dad got us great seats at the MCG. So, with Mum, Dad, the Blue Eyed Boy, Green Eyed Girl and Hubby I saw our beloved Pies win. Then, Hubby, The Kids and I went to the Rugby at Docklands, and surrounded by a sea of All Blacks we watched our beloved Wallabies lose. But the spark in the kids eyes was worth it.
- Spending an afternoon meal together with family in our lovely hills, in a small restaurant. Great food, great wine, great family.
So, there are mine. More than three… but that makes up for missing the last few weeks!
Now over to you. What made you smile this past week?
Happy Hump Day xxx
Image
Tags: blue eyed boy, freindship, green eyed girl, hump day, twitter, weekend
Posted by Naomi on May 11, 2010 in
Motherhood 
So, a few days ago it was Mothers Day. I like Mothers Day. I do. Really, it’s just that… well… sometimes I wonder what it’s all about. Each year it seems to become more and more commercial. Each year it seems to get bigger and I can’t help but wonder if this is what it’s really all about. Because here’s the thing… to me Mothers Day is about family, and saying “Hey, thanks Mum, for being Mum…” To me it’s not about expensive gifts, elaborate gestures… and really, are we as mums putting extra pressure on our own children to be, on this day, perfect? Are we???
No one is perfect. No one. Not me, not my Mum, not my kids… I stuff up… a lot. I can be a right impatient, stroppy cow of a mother. I love my Mum more than I can say, and as I get older, I love her with more appreciation and respect, I’m a mum now too, and I am beginning to understand just what it was like for her with three young children to bring up, and let me just say she did an amazing job. Amazing.
But should Mothers Day be any different to any other day? Really, should it? I just don’t know. I said in yesterdays post, what a perfect Mothers Day I had, and I did. Why? Because there was no pretence, there was no pressure. The house was a mess, there was (and still is) a huge pile of washing to fold that spills from not one but two baskets. I went with the Green Eyed Girl to run in the Mothers Day Classic. When we came home I cooked my girl and me bacon and eggs. Then I went to finish a uni assignment. In the afternoon Hubby and kids went for a walk and watched a movie while I typed away at the computer. And it was the best Mothers Day I have ever had.
There was no expectation that the day was going to be wonderful and full of happy family picture perfect moments. There was no pressure on any one to make the house tidy for me… we all live here, we all contribute to the mess, and to the cleaning up. My Hubby and kids had not been off to the nearest shopping centre to get me the latest thing I wanted (and believe me there are plenty of things I want.) This is not an anti consumerist rant, I’m as consumerist as the next person. It’s just that I think somewhere along the way the true meaning of Mothers Day has been lost.
Surely the simple things in life are what the day should be all about. And really, my kids don’t get enough pocket money to buy me the perfume I really want, or the new GHD I crave. But, what they do have, is the thought, the creativity and the love to make me their own cards, their own poems, and choose from the school fund raising stall items they really think I want. Chosen with all the love and care two children can muster… enough to fill me with love for them over and over.
Perhaps, for me, that’s what Mothers Day is… to remind me of the unconditional love my children have for me, and that I have for them.
So, my Green Eyed Girl and my Blue Eyed Boy, thank you for reminding me that really, (in the words of a favourite movie) Love actually is all around.
Image source
Tags: blue eyed boy, children, green eyed girl, parenting, wrapped in love
Posted by Naomi on May 10, 2010 in
Family,
friends,
random sweet nothings... 
How was your weekend? I must say, for me it was all in all a really lovely two days. I managed to get out in the veggie patch and pull out the now spent beans and sunflowers. I have saved the sunflower heads to collect the seeds. Even though they are brown and dry, I still love the way they look, and they are full to bursting with seeds. We only planted organic non-hybrid seeds, so seed collecting is now beginning. I planted another tripod of peas and some cauliflower seedlings before applying another thick layer of pea straw.
Late yesterday I posted my last uni assignment. I am so relieved it is all over. I feel lighter, happier, and already more myself.
But without a doubt the highlight of the weekend for me was participating in the Mothers Day Classic. It was the first time I have done it. I have been training since the start of the year, thanks so much to Emily for getting me back into running. I ran with Emily, my Green Eyed Girl, The Lovely Assistant and her two eldest children, and another teacher from work. It was an amazing thing to be part of. It really made my Mothers Day. Doing something with family and friends, united with so many others for a common cause. The Blue Eyed Boy was unwell and stayed home with Hubby, but he still got up at 5.30am to wish me a happy Mothers Day and give me the gifts he had chosen from the stall at school.
So, this was my perfect mothers day, low key, spent with family and friends, no muss, no fuss… and fish and chips for tea. Happy me, happy kids, happy Hubby, happy day.
What did the weekend hold for you?
Tags: green eyed girl, running
Posted by Naomi on May 4, 2010 in
Meme,
random sweet nothings... 
A lovely blogging friend Jade tagged me in this. (Jade is also the one who sourced the image I have used in this post. I did look for others, but this was the best image! Call it a little but of envy & sloth mixed together… well, it is a post about the seven deadly sins after all.)
All I have to do is share with you all my seven deadly sin temptations. So here then is a little insight into me!
Gluttony. What can’t you get enough of, even though it’s bad for you?
Chips, plain chips. Really I could eat them all. the. time. Put a bowlful near me and look out. Munch, munch, munch.
Lust. What does it for you?
Forearms. Seriously underrated body part. Also, a well dressed suit man… or a scruffy dreadlocked guy. But, if I’m being really honest the thing that does it for me? A really good flirt.
Wrath. What makes you cranky?
Down right rudeness. Blatant line pushing, ignoring merging traffic, shoving past people… seriously, are you so much more important than the rest of us?
Envy. What makes you green?
People with on tap child minders.
Sloth. How do you relax?
Sitting on my bed with a good book for a whole day, ignoring everyone and everything.
Pride. What are you inordinately proud of?
My Blue Eyed Boy and my Green Eyed Girl.
Greed. What do you get greedy for?
Clothes, clothes, clothes… and shoes, shoes, shoes… and some accessories.
Now it’s my turn to tag three people.
Megan from Writing out Loud
Emily from emlykd the strange
Lucy from Diminishing Lucy
Image Source
Tags: children, Clothes, green eyed girl, Meme, shoes
Posted by Naomi on Mar 3, 2010 in
Family,
Motherhood 
Today my girl turns nine… nine. She is my baby, how did this happen? I remember the day(s) she was born. Yes, it took 26 hours for her to finally make an appearance. I remember too, that she was born at exactly 2am. Her big brother, sleeping at home with his Granny, fell out of bed at exactly 2am. Her Daddy and I fell asleep sometime around 3am, snuggled in the birth centre bed together, him, her, me.
She had hair, lots and lots of hair. She still does, thick, thick waves of light brown hair. We took her home that day in the same babygro suit her brother had worn home less then two years before. One of my favourite photos of that day is of the green eyed girl, still with her hospital issue knotted surgical stocking hat on, snuggled in our bed with her blue eyed, golden haired brother. Safe and warm under the Indian peacock blue cover.
From the get go our Green Eyed Girl looked passed today and into tomorrow. Just yesterday she started talking about her tenth birthday. One foot in today, the other aways stepping out into the great unknown… seeking tomorrow and it’s promises of things yet to come. Even as a babe she felt it too hard to sleep, sleep may mean things are missed… so no, no sleep thanks.
Her names mean life, radiance, brightness and pearl. Our Green Eyed Girl is true to these names. She is a Pisces princess… a dreamer, sensitive, intuitive… an escapist, idealistic, emotional. She is full of love, laughter and dreams. She loves to cook, and imagines herself as a chef… A dessert chef, in her own sweet cafe paradise. She is learning to stay true to herself, to listen to what her own voice says. She loves clothes, and likes to plan what to wear as soon as an invite is received, a date set… I see her thinking, and planning… that she gets from me.
The Green Eyed Girl, with the infectious laugh, the always looking, always seeking eyes, with a wish for tomorrow to come, happy, happy, happy birthday. Hold tight darling girl, sit tight, for your tomorrow is coming faster than I am ready for…
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Tags: birthday, children, green eyed girl, parenting
